The Darkest of Hours
by kemiro-wolf
Summary: Human AU. The year is 2018. Five years after the biggest environmental catastrophe the world has ever seen, the Earth is in ruins. Nations have fallen, sea levels have risen, and the ozone layer is nearly diminished, allowing the sun's rays to scorch the surface to no end. Everyone is trying to find their loved ones who have been separated by the disasters of the Fist Day.


**Author's note**: Hello. Thank you for picking this fanfiction to read. Hopefully the summary caught your interest and I hope the story holds your interest as well.  
Alright, I couldn't fit this into the description, but this story will contain OCs, and yaoi will also be in later chapters. The majority of the parings will not be yaoi-based, however. Lastly, some of these parings will have nothing to do with history; like I said in the summary, this is a human alternative universe.

**Disclaimer**: I do not own Hetalia nor the official characters; those belong to Himaruya Hidekaz. I only own my OCs.

**Warnings**: Be prepared for anything.

* * *

_**The Darkest of Hours**_

Chapter 1

"_Scouting"_

* * *

"Hey, would any of you mind telling me why we're out here again?"  
Matthias' voice cut through the silence of the large, damp tunnel and caused two of the four people in front of him to cringe at the sudden disruption of the quietness. One of them, a blond man who was about five foot three, sent Matthias a dangerous look over his shoulder. "We are the scouting group," was his simple and flat-toned reply before he turned back around and continued through the darkness of the burrow. However, Matthias wasn't satisfied.  
"I already knew that, Basch," he said. Even after working with this man for two years, his leader's name still felt awkward rolling off his tongue. Matthias waved the tip of the spear he was carrying with him in the musty air. Matthias, like all the others in his group, was forced to take the weapon with him on any scouting missions in case danger should arise. "What I mean is why are we out here? What are we "scouting" for?"  
About four feet diagonal from him, on his left, a young woman with long, light brown hair braided down her her back sighed loudly, practically speaking for her remaining three comrades. "I thought you knew that, too," she added in an annoyed manner. Behind her, the talkative male scoffed. "What?" Water pipes and sewer rats?" He halted in his steps and stomped his foot down in the watery, brown goop to signify to his team that they had been waddling in sewage waste for the last hour and a half.  
"No," came the girl's answer as she and the other three people continued their way onward. They weren't that far ahead and Matthias soon caught up with the brunette. "Well what're we looking for? There aren't any more wolves to kill off the homeless people in town nor the livestock the farmers are raising. Oh yeah, and I haven't seen any enemy clans come near the town since the last attack." He smirked and crossed his arms over his chest. "And that was three months ago."  
The other four Scouts stopped and looked the blond's way. "Good for you, keeping track and all," the woman said and gave a mock applaud, causing chuckles to arise from everyone except for Matthias and the leader, who only cleared his throat loudly to catch the others' attention. "We're not done here. Keep moving."  
Everyone fell back into their positions and followed the man through the gigantic sewer pipe; they stayed silent for almost another hour.

* * *

Finally, the five people saw the orange-pink glow of dawn at the channel's opening and their shielded their grimy faces with equally dirty hands and arms from the bright sunlight. _So this is what the Underdwellers must feel like every time they leave their caves_, Matthias mused to himself. He figured that it really sucked for the underground residents when they had to come out to the surface to sell their crystals for livestock, clothes, and food that could only grow on the Earth's crust. Farmers still grew crops during the spring and summer, and harvested them in the fall to sell to the public. Their most common customers in autumn were the subterranean people who had traveled miles from their underground homes to reach the surface to buy the farmers' goods and to sell their own. But even when the sun set early in the day, the Underdwellers were still harmed by even the palest rays of light.  
As he continued to think about the terrible lives of the Underdwellers, Matthias' eyes searched the plain in front of him as the three other men moved out onto the rocky ledge the pipe practically morphed into. His brown-haired partner stayed close to his side and looked out at the clearing, too. Matthias gave her a quick glance over; aside from having light colored hair, the girl was about two inches shorter than himself and her eyes were hazel in color. She had completely buttoned up the signature grey trench coat that all of the town's search teams wore...correction. The scouting teams no longer wore grey. Since Matthias' group was the only one left, they decided to change their color to brown. The blond snorted. _She must have been from Smith's team_. Dean Smith was head of the smallest group of scouts he only had four, including himself (one less than Basch's group had). He and Matthias had been close friends, having saved each other from starving to death during their time in the refugee camp stationed just outside the city. After staying there for a while, both of them volunteered to be scouts for the city, and they both got picked for different teams. However, Matthias and Dean stayed in contact with each other and that's how the Danish native found out about the pretty much suicidal missions his team had to go on; they had to exterminate the wolf populations and rebels that terrorized the city.  
Smith lead all three of his men into the dense woods a few miles away from home on a mission to escort a group of refugees back to town. They never made it home that night, or the night after that. Basch's scouts were one of the remaining teams ordered to search for any sign of Smith and his colleagues, Yet after days of rummaging through the thick trees, the groups came up with nothing. They were sent out again, but this time Basch's men were the only ones to come back alive. The town wanted to send them back into the forest for the others but they sided against it; it wasn't worth losing anymore men.  
While his friend was still alive, Matthias that Dean had a younger sister who was on his team. The American never said her name, but the description he gave, Matthias guesses that the girl on his team was her. Brown hair, hazel eyes...she fit the description.  
The Dane turned his attention back to the plain in front of him. The area resembled a marshland, only this really didn't settle with the blond haired man because he knew this half of Hagenau had been a dense forest five years ago, but ever since the Rhine rose and covered a great deal of land, the place was left like this. The air was humid and thick, like every other morning, and the short trees were nearly overgrown by their own roots and vines. Six meters into the thick plants, something moved. Matthias wasn't sure if his bright blue eyes were the only pair that had caught the movement, and so he glanced over at his comrades for answers. The girl he had argued with while in the sewer pipe was not beside him anymore, instead he saw her a few feet away near the opposite edge of the tunnel where it seemingly halfway melted into the top of the cliff all five of them were positioned on. Obviously the others hadn't seen it either; the other two men were busy receiving orders from their leader, and from what he overheard, Matthias was going to have to venture down into the wetlands to "search for and neutralize any threats". Matthias knew that there weren't any; like he had said an hour back, the town's e army had wiped out all of the swamp wolves and all other enemy clans hadn't made an appearance since the last raid.  
The male shifted his eyes back to where he had saw the tall grass move. Suddenly, Matthias grabbed his spear and hopped off the ledge, but the back of the wooden handle scraped against the rock.  
"Hey! Where do you think you're going?" one of his partners, Lovino Vargas, called out. Matthias knew he was a man with a short fuse and hated anyone running off from the group without permission, but he only seemed to catch the Dane whenever he had a chance to escape and explore the scouting regions. Maybe he only saw him or maybe he just had a dislike for him (Matthias choose the latter), but Lovino had a very bad aim with a spear and the Italian only waved the thing in the air as he shouted.  
Just as Matthias' feet hit the hard shelf below the others, he saw a second pair of boots land beside him. It was the girl and Matthias groaned as she sat her own spear on the ground and walked over to him. "Before you ask, I heard them."  
"But you never follow orders," she said and crossed her arms. "And you know you could get punished by the city if Basch says something. He's tired of your shit, too."  
"Basch isn't going to say anything; I've been doing this for years, girly, he's kinda used to it by now. I haven't gotten "punished" by the city yet." Now it was his turn to cross his arms. A cocky smirk pierced his lips when his partner tried to cover up her confusion. "Whatever," she said quickly. The blond grabbed his weapon and was about to leap down to the second ledge when he saw the girl jump down ahead of him. "Whoa, whoa, whoa! Where do you think you're going?" he called down.  
"With you," she called back. "Er, wherever you're going." She quickly got an annoyed "no you're not" in response. Matthias landed beside her and shot her a glare before hopping down to some more rocks. "Hey! Why not?"  
"Because one: you're a girl. Two: I'm going hunting. And three: girls don't go hunting with me."  
"I can hunt," she said and followed the man. "Hey, I won't slow you down or scare away your game." She held up her hand, fingers together and palm facing Matthias. "I promise."  
The man looked at her for a good five seconds before sighing exaggeratedly. "Come on," he droned out and turned to face the marsh again. Behind him, the girl let out a low victory "yes" and jumped down to the ground. After her partner lowered himself on her left, he stretched and continued walking, not caring if his new tag-along was right behind him or not. "What's your name anyway?" he asked.  
"You'll just laugh," she said and adjusted the collar of her coat.  
Matthias stopped and allowed the girl to catch up. "No I won't," he chuckled. He was already beginning to imaging the ridiculous names a girl like her could have.  
"You're already laughing now," she informed him angrily and reached into her pocket. Shooting Matthias a quick glare, she pulled out a black hat with a bill and put it on. The Dane smiled innocently. "Okay, I won't laugh." To his right, his partner sighed and mumbled out something incoherent. "What was that again?"  
She said it a bit louder, but he still couldn't understand what she said. "Louder," he said in a sing-song voice. He earned a huff from the girl and then she said, "Liberty."  
Immediately, Matthias' smile was replaced by a puzzled expression. "Liberty? Really?"  
"I know, I know. It's a stupid name, but you can thank my parents for that." She rearranged her collar again then moved to her hat, making sure it was secure on her head. "I could have gotten a regular name that started with _L_; Lilly, Liz, Lucy...even though I hate those names, they're better than," she paused and made a disgusted face, "_Liberty_."  
"What's wrong with your name?" the taller of the two asked.  
"It's not _normal_."  
Matthias shrugged. "Can I call you Libby?"  
"Don't you even-"  
"Yeah, I'm calling you Libby." Matthias laughed and dodged the girl's spear. "Hey! You know those thing can kill people, right?" he warned after regaining his balance. Liberty held the spear tightly between her fists. "Only if they pierce your skin."  
Matthias only let out a low "meh". He rolled his shoulders and pointed to the thicket where he had seen the movement while at the pipe's mouth. "Anyway, use that thing to pierce the skin of whatever's out there."  
"Whatever you say, boss." With that, the two of them headed to their destination.

* * *

"And so what now?" Lovio asked as he paced behind Basch. The blond was sitting on the edge of the rocky surface, his legs dangled off the side and he watched the two scouts from his group vanish into the marsh. "Wait for them to come back," he said.  
"What if they take too long, huh?" the last man of the group asked. "Man, I know we're not gonna have another meal tonight."  
"Is that all you can think about, Angel? Food?" Lovino asked, slowly getting peeved at both of his colleagues; first that Dane ran off and now Angel was complaining about food. Across from him the other frowned and answered, "Right now, yeah. We haven't had anything to eat since yesterday morning," he informed the Italian. "You and I both know that's because your dear friend Matthias ran off on another hunt. Did he bring anything back? No. So all he did was waste _our_ time by being out there."  
"He's not my friend," Lovino scoffed and stopped pacing to face Angel. The man was barely five foot six, tanned, and his muscled, tanned arms protruded out of his once white wife-beater. Unlike the others, he had discarded his brown trench coat near the cave they had came out of. If he hadn't been in his right mind, Lovino would have called Angel fat, referring to him being so upset about not getting a chance to eat again, but he was in his right mind. The last time the Lovi had called Angel out his name, they ended up in a brutal fight, which resulted in Lovino having to rely on Matthias to drag him to the local hospital. The trip would have been much faster by horse or car, but neither of them had a horse, and no one could afford a car anymore.  
"Anyway, you should be more concerned with the idea that if he doesn't make it back, the town will take a more extreme precaution than not feeding us." Angel rolled his eyes, "Whatever, man." He turned around on the rock he was standing on and looked out into the swamp.  
Lovino looked back at Basch. "So what now?" he asked again and folded his arms.  
"Well," Basch started, never taking his eyes off the plain in front of him. "It's too late to go after them."  
"I _know_ that!"  
"So we just sit here and wait." The auburn-haired Italian's mouth dropped open and he nearly lost his temper right there, but the Swiss added, "If they aren't back by the time we have to return..." He trailed off and stood up. With a deep inhale through his nose, Basch turned to Lovino. "We're leaving them."  
All three of the men stayed quiet for a few minutes before Angel chimed in with, "Fine by me."

* * *

**A/N**: Okay. Well, congratulations, you finished the first chapter of The Darkest of Hours. I hope it was a good read, and I'd love some feedback/critiques/reviews on how it was or if I can do anything to improve my story and/or writing style. I plan on this story to start progressively getting darker per chapter; be prepared for something like that in Chapter 2. Lastly, Angel's name is Hispanic and is pronounced "AHN-hel". Thank you for reading and ta-ta for now.

With much love,  
-KW


End file.
